An Experiment With Crystal-Gazing; Or, The Man Who Learned Too Much

"The Crystal Ball," John William Waterhouse

There have been many cautionary tales about the hazards involved with trying to see into the future, or using the paranormal to gain knowledge of any sort.  The odds are very good that, if you are successful, you will find out much more than you really wanted to know.  Some people learn the hard way that there truly is such a thing as “too much information.”  The following story, told by a Dr. Edmond Waller, is a perfect example.  It was published in the “Annals of Psychical Science” in May 1905.

Two summers ago, my father ordered from London an object known under the name of a Crystal-Gazing Ball. He and his family left Paris on a visit to our country seat before the object arrived. It was I who received the packet from London; it came a few days after the departure of the household, just as I was on the point of setting out to rejoin my parents. I brought the crystal with me and after dinner all of us--father, mother, sister, friends, and even domestics--tried to see what the glass ball could show us: the only result was tired eyes, we could see nothing. On the evening of the following day one of the servants, a faithful old woman who had been in our service for years, as soon as she looked into the crystal (we had resumed our experiments of the preceding night) turned very pale; we asked her what she saw? “A coffin!” she replied. A few weeks afterwards her brother, a young fellow of twenty-three years of age, died of typhoid fever; he was apparently in good health at the moment of our experiment. For several evenings in succession we tried the crystal, but with the exception of the above incident we saw absolutely nothing; finally the crystal was put away in a corner and neglected by everyone.

A few months later, I went one day to see my parents in Paris. I felt suddenly a strong desire to possess the crystal, and I asked my mother to allow me to take it away with me. The next evening for forty-five minutes I conscientiously tried, but could see absolutely nothing. I worked--if I may use that word--with the crystal for nearly three weeks, without any better success. I lost my fervour, or rather I became tired of my repeated failures, and I put the object, which had given me so little satisfaction in the bottom of a drawer, with the fixed determination never again to tire my eyes and waste my time with such an uninteresting article.

However, one afternoon a few months later a curious morbid sensation seized me. I went home much earlier than usual in hopes that a good night's rest might restore me to my normal state of mind. I went to bed, but it was impossible to sleep; and, moreover, I could not help thinking of the crystal. After several hours of insomnia, I got up and, somewhat hesitatingly, I opened the drawer in which the crystal lay. I took it out and put it on the table in the dining-room; I sat down in front of it, and scarcely had I put my hands on the table and raised my eyes, when I saw one of my friends in the crystal. Only her bust appeared; the likeness was striking, and yet on the face there was something which I saw in that crystal, which I had never seen on my friend's face. It was not so much the features which were different, it was something more profound; I will not enlarge on this point, but will leave the reader to draw his own deductions. This experience left me sad and happy at the same time; happy, because I had at last seen something in the crystal; sad, because of that curious expression on my friend's face.

For the sake of the relation it bears to this history, I ought to say that the young woman who happens to be its heroine had been for me, but a few years previously, a young girl for whom I had felt more than simple admiration. She was one of those whom the vilest of us respect; an atmosphere of purity surrounded her. She was for me what a woman ought to be in the finest sense of the word. I used to see her and her mother frequently. We were suddenly separated, to my great grief. We corresponded with one another for a few months; but little by little--I ought to confess it was my own fault--our correspondence became rarer, and finally ceased altogether. Two years had gone by when one day I heard of the marriage of my friend; she was now Madame D. She and her husband came to Paris on their honeymoon. Madame D. brought her husband to see me; he was one of those men one often sees among English officers, a fine athlete, a big, impulsive, generous-hearted man. From the very first moment a great--a very great--friendship sprang up between that man and myself. I often saw the young couple together, but I saw D. more often still. Unfortunately, my friend was obliged to leave with his regiment, which was ordered to the Transvaal. As one of his wife's oldest friends, and possessing the greatest confidence in me, D. asked me if, during his absence, I would watch over his wife,—the being he loved more than all else on earth. This was an indescribable joy to me, first of all to be able to protect this young woman against the insolences of life in a great city, a life for which she was unfit, for she was morally too beautiful to be able to see the hideousness of the masses surrounding her; secondly, it was a proof of the confidence her husband had in me. Most unfortunately I was unable to fulfill my promise of protection; for, soon after her husband's departure, Madame D. was obliged to accompany her mother to America. I wrote to her three times but received no answer to my letters. It was the crystal, which served to bring us into touch with one another again. And now, having given these few, I think necessary details concerning my two friends, I will return to the evening following the one when I saw my friend's face in the crystal.

I felt extremely fatigued that day, and again went home very early. Notwithstanding my fatigue, I took up the crystal and gazed into it for a good quarter of an hour, but without the smallest result. My eyes were positively in a state of congestion, when at last I threw myself on my bed, and quickly dropped off to sleep. In a few hours I awoke, surprised to find myself in that position. I got up, sat down in front of the crystal, and instantly I saw the silhouette of my friend side by side with that of a man; the latter was less distinct than my friend, they were both surrounded by trees and people. I closed my eyes for a second, opened them and looked again into the crystal; this time I distinctly saw Mme. D. and the man who was with her--a man whom I had never seen before--as well as the paddock of the racecourse at Longchamps, with all the customary surroundings of this race-course during a meeting.

Although at that time I often went to races, my many social duties made it almost impossible for me to be present at the Race Meeting to take place on the Sunday following the evening in question, and, most certainly, if it had not been for the crystal I should never have postponed several important rendez-vous in order to go to the races that Sunday. I was unable to be present at the first two races; but one of my uncles had a horse running in the third, and for various reasons I was rather interested in this trial, so I did my utmost to arrive in time for it. I arrived at the gate of the weighing yard just as the bell rang announcing the start. I rushed to the winning post, thinking little of the crystal which was the cause of my presence at the Course and still less of the visions I had seen in it. As I came up to the stand, a little to the left of the President's box, how great was my stupefaction to see (1) Madame D. and (2) to recognise beside her, for the second time in my life, and for the first time in flesh and blood, the man of my crystal! I saw absolutely nothing of the race; after my first moment of astonishment, in spite of every convenance, I drew near to Madame D. and the individual accompanying her; but I had been seen, and they both avoided me in so marked a manner that I dared not insist. I took a chair and sat down. I felt suddenly cold all over, I saw nothing, heard nothing; it was only several minutes later that one of my friends, with a formidable slap on the shoulder, succeeded in arousing me out of the state of lethargy, into which I had fallen. Believing I was ill, and telling me I was positively livid, he tried to insist upon my leaving the race-course and taking me home. But a profound fascination held me to the spot, and, like a hound on the track, I followed the two individuals of my crystal. Thoroughly upset, when the meeting was over, I took a cab and drove to the Hotel where Mme. D., her husband and her mother generally stayed when in Paris. I left a letter imploring my friend to grant me an interview as soon as possible. For a reply, she sent me a short note, in which she told me I would see her soon, underlining the words "you don't know all.” For seven months I did everything in my power to obtain an interview with her. Finally, I was told at the Hotel that Madame D. had gone to the south of France.

Meanwhile I had continued my experiments with the crystal, though more or less intermittingly. Several times I saw therein Mme. D., her husband, the individual whom I had seen with her at Longchamps, war scenes in the Transvaal, but there was nothing very precise in my visions.

Seven days after I heard of Mme. D.'s departure to the Riviera, I saw the following vision in the crystal : Madame D. accompanied by a man--not the one of whom I have been speaking, but a totally different individual. I saw them take a cab, and the following scene unrolled itself in the clearest fashion before my eyes, just as though I were sitting in an orchestral stall at a theatre:

The streets were dirty, the cab was an ordinary one, and went in the direction of, and stopped in front of, a well-known restaurant close to the Opera. The two occupants got out of the cab, entered the restaurant, walked down a long corridor, went upstairs, turned to the left, and were shown into a private room by a head waiter. I saw everything, furniture and other utensils, very clearly. The man who accompanied Mme. D. left her alone in the room and followed the waiter; then it was that I had a sensation of speaking with Mme. D. as though I were really present with her. Simultaneously with this sensation, the scene disappeared and there was nothing before me save the crystal ball.

Two days afterwards I had a great surprise. Whilst I was attending to a patient, the domestic came into the room and handed me a card. It was D., who I thought was still in the Transvaal. He was in a hurry and could not wait to see me; he fixed a rendez-vous for afternoon tea in a shop in the Rue Caumartin. It was with a certain emotion that I went to the spot agreed upon. My friend was alone. While shaking hands he told me he had been wounded and sent home; he said he had refrained from telegraphing in order to give us a surprise, and he thanked me at the same time for the proof of friendship I had given him in taking such a brotherly interest in his wife. A more disagreeable sensation than mine at that moment it would be impossible to imagine, with my friend's big, honest eyes fixed upon me, , feeling myself grow paler and paler beneath his regard, and unable to mutter a word! What would he imagine ? The situation was not rendered any pleasanter by Mme. D.'s sudden appearance on the scene. She came hurriedly towards us, shook me warmly by the hand and made me understand by her looks that she wanted me to tell little, and that little falsehood.

At that moment, a double reasoning rose within me: Ought I to consider the day at Longchamps as black as I had painted it? And as for the scene in the private room, could not a crystal have lied ? and was it not only my pessimistic nature, which had made me see evil where none existed ? If such were the case, my strict duty was to think no longer of my past fancies and suspicions, and especially to refrain from speaking of them to D. On the other hand, I could not understand Mme. D.'s conduct, and, without knowing why, I could not help believing what the crystal had suggested to me; it was with the greatest difficulty, that I was able to pass the following half-hour with D. and his wife without making any allusion to the crystal. Our conversation was in fact very troubled and disjointed; there was something disagreeable in the air, so to speak.

I arranged to meet D. again the next day and to dine with him and his wife; but when the moment came, I felt in such a bad mood that, fearing my gloomy countenance might mar the evening, I begged my friends to excuse me. I went home early in a state of excessive and unaccountable excitement. Instead of dining, I took my crystal, sat down in front of it and gazed at it. For several minutes I saw nothing, then all at once and very clearly I saw Mme. D. with the same individual who, in the previous vision, had accompanied her to the restaurant. For the second time the crystal made me a spectator of the scene in the private room, with this difference: I remained until Mme. D. and her restaurant friend left the building; I saw the man lead the woman to a private carriage, and without hearing a word, unable to explain how the phenomenon was produced, I understood that he fixed a rendez-vous with Mme. D. at a spot which was unknown to me, and that he would return on Wednesday at the same hour and at the same restaurant. I understood that the order had been given for the same room to be kept for them. Everything was so clear, that I had not the slightest doubt but that I was gazing at a reality--for several minutes I was thoroughly convinced of it.

At four o'clock on the following afternoon D. came to see me. Almost at once the conversation turned upon delicate ground--his wife. Was it the expression of my face, my manner of acting, which made him suspicious  I cannot say, but, suddenly and abruptly, my friend demanded a concise and precise account of my state of mind concerning himself and his wife. Without stopping to think, and convinced somehow that I had to tell him everything, I explained all to him.

Bitter words followed, and it was only out of respect for the spot we were at, that we refrained from committing violent acts--acts which we would certainly have regretted. I loved the man more than ever, I was jealous of his stubbornness and, for his own sake, I was now determined not to permit him to live any longer in his fool's paradise.

As for his wife, I could not help feeling a great pity for her and doing all in my power to prevent her from falling any lower. I implored my friend to watch very closely the people with whom she came in contact. After a few more or less flattering epithets--which might be summed up very simply in his looking upon me as a fool--D. made me promise to go to the theatre with him and afterwards to sup in the very same private room where, according to the crystal, his wife was to be. I accepted without any hesitation, convinced that my friend was right, that all would be for the best, and that henceforth my little glass ball would but serve as letter-weight and nothing more. I had not felt so happy for a long time.

We were punctual at our rendez-vous; we passed a most agreeable evening, criticising rather the crystal and my mild folly than the spectacle at which we were present. We went straight from the theatre to the restaurant, where the crystal was going to be definitely, once and for all, condemned as a liar of liars. We arrived at the restaurant at twenty minutes past twelve. The room which my friend had reserved resembled very little the room I had seen in the crystal. We were overflowing with good humour and light-heartedness; we sat down to supper and threw far away-ah ! far away-every thought of the crystal and its manifestations. We spoke of things which had nothing whatever in common with the cause of our tête-à-tête in that private room. Half an hour passed by, when all at once, without any reason, what seemed like a hallucination to my friend and myself seized hold of me; my gaiety disappeared and I could scarcely articulate a single word. A few minutes passed in this way, when, suddenly, my friend and I recognised the voice of Mme. D. I knew not what to think, much less what to say. D. rushed out of the room like a madman. I followed him as quickly as I could, but not quickly enough to prevent a catastrophe. D. sprang upon the individual who had been so faithfully reproduced by the crystal, and only released his hold of him at the door of the restaurant. The man was in a sorry state; he disappeared immediately--probably to avoid any further scandal.

Almost without saying a word to each other, D. and I separated. He went to his hotel; and I, acting on his wish, looked after his wife.

The consequence of this drama was the separation of the husband and wife and, for me, the loss of the man for whom I had such a deep friendship. Quite recently and indirectly I learned that Mme. D. was confined in an asylum.